As The Crow Flies
by midwestern-duchess
Summary: "You do care. You care so much you feel as though you will bleed to death with the pain of it." -JK Rowling
The red cape flaps pathetically in the brittle winter breeze, provoking an annoyed eye roll from the woman.

She'd always hated the cape, and is more than willing to blame a fair amount of his absurd hero-complex on the ridiculous accessory.

He doesn't seem to sense her presence—or perhaps he's just ignoring her. Winter's not sure which idea frustrates her more.

She considers simply standing at the top of the hill and glaring at the back of his head until he finally gathers the shreds of his decency and turns to face her, when something in his hand gleams in the light, and her breath catches in her chest.

A cane. _Ozpin's_ cane.

Qrow spins around at her soft sound of surprise, giving Winter a clear view of the second item he holds. His flask. An irritated sort of amusement draws an unwilling smirk from her lips. How predictable.

"The Army has a rumor about you," she calls to him, her voice high and clear and carrying cleanly through the chilled air. He gazes up at her, taking a swig from his flask.

"Yeah?" he replies, lowering the drink. Even from her perch at the top of the hill, she can see his eyes dance with humor. "And what might that be?"

She begins her descent—footing sure despite the snow and steepness of the hill. She keeps her arms folded tightly behind her back, her spine straight as a blade, chin tilted up in a preemptive display of haughtiness leftover from her days at the Schnee Manor. Some habits die hard.

"They say you have but two constant companions," she begins, boots crunching in the snow as she nears him. "Death, being one."

He chuckles darkly at this, lifting his flask in a toast before taking another drink.

She eyes the action with disdain. "The other is alcohol," she finishes, a bit unnecessarily as she waits for Qrow to finish a particularly noisy pull from the flask.

He finally tucks the drink away, twirling the cane in his other hand. Her eyes snap to the movement.

"Doesn't the Army have anything better to do than gossip about washed-up Hunters?" There's a challenge in his voice. There always is.

She glances up at him sharply. "Doesn't a washed-up Hunter have anything better to do than harass the Army?" she argues.

He just laughs again, shaking his head, and Winter watches him, her expression a mask of frigid indifference.

Silence settles between them for a moment, each waiting to see who will speak first.

"So," Qrow drawls after the quiet has gone on long enough. "The Ice Queen has graced me with her presence." He twists his lips in a cocky smirk as he drops into a formal bow that is nothing short of mocking. Winter's eyes narrow. That's Qrow's specialty—derision without words. "I'm _flattered."_

Winter's face is drawn tight in quiet anger. "Are you so distraught over your nieces that you have abandoned all sense of self-preservation?" she demands coolly. No sense in dancing around the issue. Especially not if he plans on flaunting that cane like an _engagement_ ring.

His crimson eyes shine in the winter sun as his grin gains an edge of smugness. "How touching," he remarks, smirking at the face she pulls in response. "You really do care."

"For the safety and security of our continent's future?" she retorts. "Certainly. You're a skilled Hunter and were involved in Ozpin's inner circle." She eyes him disdainfully, arms folded regally behind her back. "My own personal opinion of you has nothing to do with that."

"And what _is_ your own personal opinion, Specialist Schnee?" he asks, lifting a brow. She curses inwardly, too well-bred to snort. She'd walked right into that one.

Still, her expression remains carefully schooled. One does not grow up in the Schnee household without learning how to perfectly maintain a poker face.

"My personal opinion is that you're an idiot and are subjecting yourself to suicide," she answers archly, all cold professionalism and frigid regality. Her tone drips icy indifference, but Qrow knows the once-heiress well enough—she's all but _burning_ with emotion over his decision. Still, he feigns injury. It's been a while since he's gotten a good rise out of her.

"Well, if that's all…" he touches two fingers to his forehead in what is perhaps the poorest excuse for a salute she's ever seen and turns to leave, his cape rippling at the movement.

Winter scowls. He's baiting her.

 _"Qrow!"_ she snaps, advancing sharply on the Hunter, who keeps distancing himself at an amiable pace. "Qrow, enough. Of course I'm concerned, you fool. Do you think I would have bothered to come all the way out here if I wasn't?"

He shrugs. He doesn't face her, but he at least stops moving, so she too stills her steps, glaring squarely at his back.

"Maybe you just like sightseeing," he offers. "Didn't want to be so _arrogant_ as to think the mighty Specialist Schnee would haul herself all the way out here for little ole _me."_

Winter's expression is flat with annoyance as Qrow turns back, smirking at his own joke.

"You look like you could use a drink," he tells her, reaching for the flask.

"If you so much as point that flask in my direction I will remove your arm entirely," she returns, her words clipped and sharpened. She shifts her weight, deliberately giving him a better view of her sword's scabbard strapped to her side.

He eyes the weapon without a glimmer of interest. "So touchy," he mutters, voice muffled as he takes another pull from the flask.

Winter glares. "It's called being _serious,_ Qrow," she snaps. "Something I'd appreciate you attempting at some point."

He heaves a dramatic sigh, dropping his head backwards in a look of false exasperation. "I'm being _very_ serious, Winter," he tells her, lifting his head to gaze at her earnestly. _"Seriously."_

"You are _not!"_ she protests, temper finally flaring under his continued jokes. "Clearly you have not considered what you are attempting to pull off with _any_ degree of seriousness! You cannot possibly think yourself capable of carrying on the work of three singularly gifted individuals by yourself."

"I mean," Qrow shrugs. _"I_ think I'm pretty great."

Winter stares at him rigidly, eyebrow arched in a way that clearly communicates he has about five seconds to come up with a better answer before she reaches down his throat and forcibly pulls one out.

He smirks. He gets that look a lot.

"Look, Winter, what do you want?" He's tucked the cane away some point during their argument, and spreads his hands. "There's no one left. If I don't do anything, then nothing's gonna _get_ done."

"So you'd rather needlessly sacrifice yourself," she remarks coldly. "How noble." Her tone is just this side of freezing, her words sharp and mocking.

There's a slight tremor in her voice that trips something in the back of his mind—it rattles and shakes for attention under the suffocating blanket of uncertainty that shrouds his thoughts. Genuine concern softens his harsh features, and he sighs.

"Winter," be begins quietly. "I have to do this." Something that might have been a smile tugs at his lips, but his eyes remain troubled. "I can't be the second Branwen to drop the ball. Look at Ruby and Yang," he huffs out a sigh, looking away, staring at the blinding white hills to try and dispel the image of his battered and broken nieces his mind's eye presents to him. "They're kids, Winter. Weiss and Blake too." He turns back to look at her, and her heart stutters uncomfortably in her chest at the look on his face. "What kinda Hunter would I be if I left the fighting to them, huh? What kind of _uncle?_ What kind of self-respecting adult does that?"

"The kind with something to live for," she whispers back, but she knows a lost cause when she sees one. She won't sway him.

His regular smirk curls his lips, but it still doesn't touch his eyes. "I've lived for a lot in this life, Winter," he reminds her quietly. "These kids though—they're just kids. They haven't even gotten the chance to live for _themselves."_

Her hands curl into fists where she holds them stiffly behind her back. So that's it then. This is farewell.

"If you have everything figured out," she begins in a deadly tone that draws an arched eyebrow from her companion. "Then tell me: what do you plan to do when those who fought and presumably destroyed Ozpin come for _you?"_

Qrow shrugs, utterly unbothered by her words and their lethal implications. "Well, for one thing, Oz isn't dead," he begins. He holds up a hand when Winter snaps her mouth open to fire back. "Don't fight me on this, Winter, please. Just trust me. He's not dead. No, I don't know where he is. No, I don't know what happened. I doubt he's skipping around whistling _show_ tunes, but I can promise you he is still somewhere on this hunk of rock." He gazes up at her, crimson eyes blazing like the eyes of Grimm. "Got it?"

She nods slowly. She'd be inclined to trust him—he knows far more about this business than she does—but she'd descended down to the crypts beneath the school where Ozpin and the ever-elusive Cinder Fall had fought.

Winter is a solider. She has seen carnage and debris and ruin over and over again, and can analyze it at a glance. It her professional opinion, no one short of a _god_ could have walked away from the kind of destruction the chamber had been left in.

 _"But,"_ his voice draws her back to the present, and she glances back at him questioningly. He's grinning again, having pulled the cane back out from wherever it'd been tucked away to rest it across his shoulders. "If something _does_ go wrong, then I guess I'll need a knight in shining armor to come save me."

His tone is riddled with amusement, and she scowls at him. She wants to beg him to stay, but is unable to bring her pride to bend that far.

"Do not flatter yourself," Winter tells him tightly. "I have many duties to occupy my time. You land rather low on the list, if at all."

He snickers, twirling the cane in his nimble fingers. "You're lying," he drawls, eyes alight with mischief. "You'd help me out in a heartbeat."

Part of her longs to demand if he'd do the same for her—she knows beyond a shadow of a doubt he would—but Winter can only treat him to a stiff glare.

"Do not presume to know my heart," she warns him lowly.

A delighted smile splits his lips. "Ah, so you admit that you have one?"

She scowls. "If I do, it is a small and ugly thing of no consequence."

He laughs at that. Throws his head back in an honest, genuine crow of amusement that echoes throughout the hillside. She watches him, stiffening her lip against the emotions that threaten to overwhelm her.

Their eyes catch when he lowers his head—ice against ruby—and he tips her a wink.

"See ya, Ice Queen," he tells her softly. "We'll see each other again."

She longs to say something— _anything_ —but her tongue folds under the weight of the words, and she can only watch as he turns his back on her, striding across the where the hill drops at a dizzying height, lightly stepping off into thin air.

Black feathers flutter down as the crow gives a shrill caw before flapping away. She swallows hard, a sudden grief gripping her. _That could be the last time you see him,_ her subconscious taunts.

"You fool," she whispers, clenching her hands tightly at her side. She grits her teeth, squeezing her eyes shut. "You stupid, reckless, valorous, _fool."_

* * *

 _I'm back in the RWBY game_

Okay so this whole thing was based off of this incredible comic by eunnieverse that you should all go look at if you haven't already seen it. A few lines are taken directly from the comic, because the whole thing is just gold.

I love Winter and Qrow so much, honestly. Their relationship fascinates me, and I kinda want to write more. It was also fun to write about canon Winter and not the angry, low-key crazy, power-hungry Winter that's in Nevermore.

I wanted to name this piece "Eat Crow" as in the idiom that means to have to accept a humiliating defeat, but was worried nobody would get it and then I'd be stuck with an incredibly awkward title for this piece. _  
_


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